ReadWrite - messaging appshttp://readwrite.com/tag/messaging-apps
enCopyright 2015 Wearable World Inc.http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tech/rssTue, 03 Mar 2015 14:37:50 -0800WhatsApp Hits 700 Million Users<!-- tml-version="2" --><div tml-image="ci01c3f32d90019512" tml-image-caption="" tml-bad-render-layout="inline"><figure><img src="http://a3.files.readwrite.com/image/upload/c_fill,cs_srgb,dpr_1.0,q_80,w_620/MTI3MjEyNTkwNzA2MjM1ODcw.jpg" /><figcaption></figcaption></figure></div><p>WhatsApp has crossed another milestone number, with founder Jan Koum announcing that the messaging service now has more than 700 million active monthly users. </p><p>That's 250 million more users than WhatsApp had in February 2014, when Facebook announced plans to buy it for $19 billion. (The deal closed in October, with Koum taking a Facebook board seat and continuing to run WhatsApp.)</p><p>For comparison, Twitter <a href="https://about.twitter.com/company">has 284 million active monthly users</a>, and it's currently worth around $23 billion.&nbsp;So in less than a year, WhatsApp has added nearly as many users as Twitter has altogether.</p><p>&nbsp;Snapchat, another messaging service, is more close-mouthed about its user numbers. An August <a href="http://blogs.wsj.com/digits/2014/08/26/snapchat-said-to-have-more-than-100-million-monthly-active-users/">Wall Street Journal report</a> put the number at more than 100 million. That would indicate rapid growth if <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/snapchat-active-users-exceed-30-million-2013-12">this Business Insider report</a>, from December 2013, correctly estimated the number of monthly active users at 30 million—but still puts it far behind WhatsApp.</p><p>Emails leaked by Sony hackers in November revealed that Facebook had offered more than $3 billion to buy Snapchat, confirming the social network's strong interest in the fast-growing field of messaging apps.&nbsp;</p><p><em>Photo by <a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/86979666@N00/8689077655">Tsahi Levent-Levi</a>&nbsp;</em></p>Messaging is the new social networking.http://readwrite.com/2015/01/06/whatsapp-700-million
http://readwrite.com/2015/01/06/whatsapp-700-millionSocialTue, 06 Jan 2015 15:58:37 -0800Richard Procter5 Big Trends that Shaped Social Media in 2014<!-- tml-version="2" --><p><em><a href="http://readwrite.com/series/reflect">ReadWriteReflect</a> offers a look back at major technology trends, products and companies of the past year.</em></p><p>When we're mobile, we're social. In 2014, we spent 45 minutes a day on social apps on our smartphones and tablets—the biggest use for our devices after games, according to Flurry, the&nbsp;<a href="http://www.flurry.com/bid/109749/Apps-Solidify-Leadership-Six-Years-into-the-Mobile-Revolution">mobile-analytics firm Yahoo purchased this year</a>. Social applications—social networks, messaging apps, and other forms of connection—now account for 28 percent of our time spent on apps, up from 24 percent in 2013.</p><div tml-image="ci01c2dd7ef001c80a" tml-image-caption="Flurry's analysis of 2014's mobile usage." tml-bad-render-layout="inline" tml-render-size="medium" tml-render-position="right"><figure><img src="http://a1.files.readwrite.com/image/upload/c_fill,cs_srgb,dpr_1.0,q_80,w_620/MTI2OTA3Mjc2MjQ1MTI1MTMw.jpg" /><figcaption>Flurry's analysis of 2014's mobile usage.</figcaption></figure></div><p>Facebook still dominates our usage. But in many ways, the Facebook-defined paradigm for social networking fell apart in 2014. Social connections aren't about one big place where we all hang out—it's about a fragmented landscape of apps with connections that are more provisional than Facebook's old friends list.</p><p>These changes aren't lost on the Web's dominant social network. Facebook itself has been a participant in and sometimes a driver of these changes. But the most interesting part of the social landscape of 2014 is the sense that it's no longer just Facebook's game.</p><h2><strong>Breaking Up Is Easy To Do—Even For Facebook</strong></h2><p>Smartphones, always pulsing with notifications and updates, break our attention spans down to mere seconds. The smart response by social networks is to break themselves into multiple apps, or for new apps to define their purposes ever more narrowly.</p><p>The app that epitomized this trend was Yo. Launched on April Fool's Day, the messaging app only sent one word to your friends: "Yo."&nbsp;</p><p>And Facebook’s standalone Messenger app brought the fragmentation trend to the masses. Some objected to its mandatory imposition, but it allowed us to converse with friends without contending with updates from our noisy news feeds. Standalone apps are like shortcuts to different social features that, on the Web, might make more sense as part of one big website.&nbsp;<br tml-linebreak="true" /><br tml-linebreak="true" />“Connecting everyone means giving the power to share different kinds of content with different groups of people,” Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg<a href="http://www.bizjournals.com/southflorida/how-to/technology/2014/02/what-facebook-paper-means-to-business.html?page=all"> said in a conference call</a> with analysts early this year. “This is something we focused on by launching separate mobile apps beyond the main Facebook app – Messenger and Instagram are great examples of this.”</p><p>Paper, a social news-reading app, and Groups, an app for Facebook-organized communities, are more examples of apps Facebook spun off this year.</p><p>Foursquare also pursued the break-up strategy, spinning off Swarm as an app just for location-based check-ins.</p><h2><strong>Messaging Dominated The Conversation</strong></h2><p>Facebook's $17 billion purchase of WhatsApp focused everyone's attention on the <a href="http://readwrite.com/2014/09/25/messaging-apps-niche-yo-snapchat-whatsapp">rise of messaging apps</a>. Mostly free to use, these mobile alternatives to old-fashioned texting or desktop-based instant messaging attracted hundreds of millions of users. And there was no shortage of contenders, from WhatsApp to Snapchat, Line, Viber, WeChat, and others.</p><p>The reasons we used messaging apps in 2014 varied wildly, from the high cost of texting in Europe to the preference for visual communication with emojis in Asia to American teens' desire for a less-permanent way of sending pictures.</p><p>The truth is that each messaging app serves its own purpose for connecting with people. The inherent complexity of human nature means that no one app will be able to serve all of our needs for connection. &nbsp;</p><h2>The Rise Of The Anti-Facebook</h2><p>This was the year we lost our innocence about Facebook. It was easy enough to ignore the abstract warnings about how the social network tracked users across the Web. It was harder to stomach the way Facebook researchers conducted a massive psychological experiment on almost 700,000 unknowing users for one week, tweaking the posts displayed in their feeds to make them happier or sadder.</p><p>There was also the incident where a disgruntled user &nbsp;<a href="http://readwrite.com/2014/09/12/facebook-drag-queens-real-name-controversy">sought to kick drag queens off of Facebook</a>&nbsp;by reporting them for violating a rule that the social network rarely enforced.</p><p>Facebook executives apologized for both incidents, but together, they lay the groundwork for the rise of&nbsp;<a href="http://readwrite.com/2014/09/25/ello-what-is-it-social-network-facebook-privacy">new social network Ello</a>. Marketing itself as the "anti-Facebook,"&nbsp;creator Paul Budnitz promised an advertising- and tracking-free environment.&nbsp;</p><p>It's not clear if Ello will ever attract a large number of users. But its very existence is a reminder that social applications <a href="http://readwrite.com/2014/12/17/ello-business-lessons-users-first">must put users, not advertisers, first</a>.<br tml-linebreak="true" /> </p><h2><strong>The End Of The Friend Request</strong></h2><p>Social applications are slowly but surely <a href="http://readwrite.com/2014/08/06/social-networks-friend-request-follow-model">distancing themselves from one-to-one connections</a> and the concept of the two-way "friend request." Now everyone from Instagram to LinkedIn and Foursquare encourages users to "follow" other profiles.</p><p>“Following” people, celebrities, and brands that interest you gives networks more opportunities to grow than when they limit you to a small, finite pool of real-life friends or two-way connections. There’s less friction, too, in waiting for someone to accept a friend request.&nbsp;</p><h2>No Names, Please</h2><p>The ultimate form of connection we explored in 2014 was one where we didn't ask for names. Secret, Yik Yak, and Whisper all took off, showing the strong interest people have in online anonymity. This, too, was a reaction to Facebook's creation of a world where everything we do online gets attached to our name.</p><p>These experiments with anonymity had their downsides. Secret struggled with mean-spirited chatter, eventually putting in measures to <a href="http://readwrite.com/2014/08/22/secret-app-bullying-anonymous-update">keep users from including names in their posts</a>. Whisper <a href="http://readwrite.com/2014/10/17/whisper-dont-trust-anonymous-apps-guardian">got in trouble</a> when executives bragged to reporters about their ability to track posters.</p><p>It's clear that anonymity or pseudonymity, in a throwback to the early days of the Web, are staging a revival. Even Facebook got into the game with an app called Rooms, which isn't strictly speaking anonymous but instead uses instant-messaging-style handles.</p><p>What will 2015 hold? We'd love to hear your predictions.</p><p><em>Lead photo by&nbsp;<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/jasonahowie/8583949219/">Jason Howie</a></em></p>Messaging, following, and anonymity.http://readwrite.com/2014/12/31/2014-social-trends
http://readwrite.com/2014/12/31/2014-social-trendsSocialWed, 31 Dec 2014 12:34:46 -0800Ritika TrikhaYou Can Now Send Tweets—And Other Links—In Twitter Direct Messages<!-- tml-version="2" --><div tml-image="ci01af657b57d9860d" tml-image-caption=""><figure><img src="http://a2.files.readwrite.com/image/upload/c_fill,cs_srgb,w_620/MTE5NDg0MDYyNDg2NzkxNjk1.png" /><figcaption></figcaption></figure></div><p>Twitter announced Thursday that users can now <a href="https://blog.twitter.com/2014/share-a-tweet-through-direct-messages">share public tweets inside direct messages</a>.</p><p>If that announcement struck you as a headscratcher—couldn't you do that before?—you're not wrong. You've long been able to include links to a tweet's detail page in a private message on Twitter. But especially on mobile devices, that's been a cumbersome, multistep process.</p><p>Twitter now makes it a feature that's easily available by pressing down on a tweet for a longer period, which could encourage more people to have private conversations about tweets. That, in turn, might get them to participate more on Twitter, especially if they're not comfortable responding publicly with a reply, retweet, or favorite.</p><blockquote><p>See also: <a href="http://readwrite.com/2014/11/18/twitter-search-back-to-2006"><strong>Search All The Tweets! Twitter Now Indexed All The Way Back To 2006</strong></a></p></blockquote><p>Twitter’s new tools for including links to tweets in private messages will go a long way toward encouraging people to use it for private conversations.</p><p>“Twitter is already a great place for public conversation; now it’s also easier to privately discuss things you care about,” Sachin Agarwal, a project manager at Twitter, <a href="https://blog.twitter.com/2014/share-a-tweet-through-direct-messages">wrote</a>.</p><p>Twitter CEO Dick Costolo has often spoken about encouraging users to have private conversations about public tweets. This removes one barrier, but Twitter has more work to do.</p><p>In particular, it needs to add the ability to have private group conversations, <a href="http://readwrite.com/2014/08/08/twitter-learn-from-pinterest-conversations">as Pinterest has done</a>. Twitter direct messages are only one-on-one chats at present.</p><blockquote><p><strong>See also: <a href="http://readwrite.com/2014/08/08/twitter-learn-from-pinterest-conversations">What Twitter Can Learn From Pinterest Conversations</a></strong></p></blockquote><p>Separately, Twitter restored the ability to send links of any kind earlier this week. More than a year ago, Twitter blocked the ability to send most links through direct messages, <a href="http://readwrite.com/2013/10/16/twitter-direct-messages-dm-links-blocked-spam">in a move to prevent spam</a>, which was spreading as hackers hijacked Twitter users' accounts to send links to harmful malware pages.&nbsp;</p><p>Even then, some links weren't blocked—in particular, links to twitter.com, an indication of how important Twitter felt these private conversations about tweets were.</p><p>Twitter’s previous restrictions on sending links through direct messages were not unique. Tumblr also prevents users from sharing links with one another through private <a href="https://www.tumblr.com/docs/en/using_messages">Ask messages</a>, ostensibly to ward off spam. (The less popular Tumblr Fan Mail, which cannot be posted publicly on users’ Tumblr blogs, does allow links.)</p><p><em>Illustration by Madeleine Weiss for ReadWrite</em></p>Better private chats for a public network.http://readwrite.com/2014/11/21/twitter-send-links-direct-messages
http://readwrite.com/2014/11/21/twitter-send-links-direct-messagesSocialFri, 21 Nov 2014 06:39:45 -0800Lauren OrsiniThis Is Why Your Facebook Feed Is Filled With Cartoon Stickers<!-- tml-version="2" --><div tml-image="ci01bcee8ea001c80a" tml-image-caption=""><figure><img src="http://a5.files.readwrite.com/image/upload/c_fill,cs_srgb,dpr_1.0,q_80,w_620/MTI1MjM3MTg1MTkxMzg1NTY2.jpg" /><figcaption></figcaption></figure></div><p>Brace yourself: The stickers are coming to Facebook.</p><p>Those adorable graphics or cartoons of special characters have, up until now, lived only in messages to friends on Messenger. But people will soon be able to share them in comments on posts from people, in groups, and on events, <a href="https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10103479011604702&amp;set=a.801078829492.2481806.5101930&amp;type=1&amp;theater">Facebook announced Monday</a>.</p><p>The feature will be rolling out across Facebook in the next day or so, Bob Baldwin, a Facebook engineer who built the stickers-in-comments feature,&nbsp;<a href="https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10103479011604702&amp;set=a.801078829492.2481806.5101930&amp;type=1&amp;theater">wrote in a Facebook post</a>—which was shortly strewn with stickers:</p><blockquote><p>Stickers in Comments was started as a hackathon project in New York with me and Kwame, where we built the prototype for web in a single night. When we turned it on for employees soon after, they loved it. We later built it for mobile web at a hackathon in California, and the iOS &amp; Android versions soon after.</p></blockquote><p>To add a sticker to a comment, like <a href="http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/sites/pusheen">beloved cat Pusheen</a>, simply click or tap on the smiley icon that appears to the right of the comment field under a post. It works on both the desktop and mobile versions of Facebook.&nbsp;</p><p>This might be the greatest thing to ever happen to Facebook comments—that is, until Facebook finally supports GIFs.&nbsp;</p><div tml-image="ci01bceecc2001c80a" tml-image-caption=""><figure><img src="http://a2.files.readwrite.com/image/upload/c_fill,cs_srgb,dpr_1.0,q_80,w_620/MTI1MjM3NDQ5MDYzNDM3NTg2.jpg" /><figcaption></figcaption></figure></div><p><em>Lead photo by <a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/misskelly/7956921808">Kelly Reeves</a></em></p>OMG, finally.http://readwrite.com/2014/10/13/facebook-stickers-comments-omg
http://readwrite.com/2014/10/13/facebook-stickers-comments-omgSocialMon, 13 Oct 2014 13:17:44 -0700Selena LarsonWhy No One's Going To Win The Messaging War<!-- tml-version="2" --><p><em>This is the first part of ReadWrite's four-part series on the <a href="http://readwrite.com/series/future-of-messaging/">future of messaging</a>.</em></p><p>I was a teenage early adopter.</p><p>To me, it seemed like everyone else in my 8th grade class already had a cell phone when I got my first one a decade ago. But back then, <a href="http://www.pewinternet.org/2005/07/25/teens-forge-forward-with-the-internet-and-other-new-technologies/">only a third of American teens had sent a text message</a>, according to the Pew Research Center. Three out of four teens, however, used instant messaging on their computers.</p><p>Fast forward a decade, and that percentage has neatly flipped. By 2012, <a href="http://www.pewinternet.org/2012/03/19/teens-smartphones-texting/">75% of American teens were texting</a>, most of them daily, while only 22% used desktop-oriented instant messaging services on a daily basis.&nbsp;</p><p>In that same time frame, social networks have become ubiquitous, and to some oppressive. Broadcasting our daily activities to a hungry audience of casual online acquaintances isn't something most people care to do. For them, messaging is a retreat to a safer, more intimate way of communicating.</p><p>Now texting is exploding—and fragmenting. Where we'll end up a decade from now is just as hard to predict as the massive leap we took from 2004 to 2014.</p><p>Controlling the way we communicate is a valuable prize, as Facebook and Twitter's large valuations reveal. If social networks, which fostered the idea of broadcasting our status, give way to more private tools like messaging apps, the very shape of the Internet landscape will be transformed beyond recognition.</p><h2>Beyond Texting</h2><p>I’m pretty sure my first text was “I finally got a cell phone.” When I got my megatrendy <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nokia_3310">Nokia 3310</a>&nbsp;candybar-style phone with a Superman case, texting meant you have a cell phone, and having a cell phone meant you could text.&nbsp;</p><div tml-image="ci01b529046112860c" tml-image-caption="" tml-render-size="medium" tml-render-position="right"><figure><img src="http://a4.files.readwrite.com/image/upload/c_fill,cs_srgb,w_620/MTE4MDAzNDE3ODcwMzM3NTUw.png" /><figcaption></figcaption></figure></div><p>Messages are more than text, and more than phones. We now send messages using apps that add photos, videos, and other forms of communication while bypassing cell-phone companies' networks.&nbsp;</p><p>And messaging has become a high-stakes business, with billions of dollars at play.</p><p>In the last few years, a handful of massively successful messaging applications—and even more copycats—have launched. They all aim to provide a better way to communicate privately, one that's superior to both traditional text messaging and to older social networks like Facebook and Twitter. And they are made possible by the rise of smartphones and fast, cheap data networks around the world.</p><blockquote><p><strong>See Also: <a href="http://readwrite.com/2014/03/06/10-biggest-popular-mobile-messaging-apps-world-whatsapp">The 10 Most Popular Mobile Messaging Apps In The World</a></strong></p></blockquote><p>The most notable one is WhatsApp, a company that Facebook is in the process of acquiring for $19 billion, which now has more than 500 million users. WeChat, a messaging service developed by Chinese Internet giant Tencent, is closing in on WhatsApp with 438 million users. There are other contenders including Kik, a messaging and gaming app; Line, which filed <a href="http://dealbook.nytimes.com/2014/07/16/messaging-app-line-files-for-i-p-o-in-tokyo/">for an IPO</a>&nbsp;in July; Viber, acquired by Japanese e-commerce company&nbsp;<a href="http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-02-17/rakuten-falls-on-900-million-deal-to-acquire-viber-message-app.html">Rakuten for $900 million</a>; and the disappearing-message startup Snapchat, which Facebook has now&nbsp;<a href="http://readwrite.com/2014/06/09/facebook-slingshot-snapchat-poke-ephemeral-messaging">tried to copy</a> twice.</p><h2>The Text To End All Texts?</h2><p>All of them face the most formidable competition not in each other but in the Short Message Service protocol, or SMS—the standard for text messages used by cell-phone companies around the world.</p><p>The first text message was <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/the-first-text-message-ever-2013-12">sent in 1992</a>. Neil Papworth, a software engineer for the Sema Group in the United Kingdom, sat down and tapped out “Merry Christmas.”</p><p>In the United States, where wireless carriers were late to offer standardized text messaging, teens drove adoption. But in the rest of the world, texting was a way of avoiding wallet-draining phone calls. (In Europe and Asia, wireless customers typically pay by the minute rather than buying monthly buckets of minutes or unlimited plans, as we do in the States.)</p><p>In 1995 people were sending only <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20020215194430/http://www.gsmworld.com/news/press_2001/press_releases_4.shtml">5 messages a year</a>&nbsp;on average, through a limited set of wireless carriers. That number has skyrocketed. In<a href="http://blogs.forrester.com/michael_ogrady/12-06-19-sms_usage_remains_strong_in_the_us_6_billion_sms_messages_are_sent_each_day">&nbsp;2012</a>, people around the world sent 2 trillion text messages. That's 333 for each person with a<a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/10/11/cell-phones-world-subscribers-six-billion_n_1957173.html">&nbsp;phone on the planet.</a>&nbsp;Those messages cost almost nothing for carriers to transmit, but the senders typically pay a few pennies for each one, making it a lucrative business—one that messaging apps are eager to take a piece of.&nbsp;</p><h2>Why Texting Isn’t Enough</h2><p>Messaging is more than a business opportunity. It has deep meaning in our daily lives.</p><p>What makes messaging special—and drives us away from social media—is that messaging apps let us talk one on one, or with a small group. They give us a direct line of communication to people we care about. We can send a note that won't get buried among a hundred other people's updates in a news feed or timeline.</p><p>But how will we send those notes? That's the critical question.</p><p>The inexorable rise of Facebook, and the concomitant decline of Myspace and Friendster, has led some to think that any app with social features is playing in a winner-take-all market. But that doesn't seem to be happening in messaging.</p><p>Despite Facebook's dominance, we've grown accustomed to using different social networks to manage our online identities—Facebook for friends, LinkedIn for work, and Twitter for news and information. That digital fragmentation will apply to private communications, too.</p><p>It's easier than ever to <a href="http://readwrite.com/2014/07/11/one-click-messaging-app">build a messaging app</a>, which can simply pull from our phone's address books to populate a list of people to talk to.&nbsp;It's not hard to keep up with multiple inboxes on a modern smartphone, where notifications tell us when we've got a new message.</p><p>Traditional SMS text messages won't go away anytime soon. But what SMS lacks is precisely what gives messaging apps opportunities to grow. For many, texting still costs quite a bit of money. And it is restricted to 160 characters; you can send pictures and video on some services, but carriers haven't worked out all of the kinks, and they're aiming to charge even more for those extra. Texting may be the original mobile messaging service, but its shortcomings are painfully acute.&nbsp;</p><div tml-image="ci01af657b43e1860d" tml-image-caption="" tml-render-position="left" tml-render-size="medium"><figure><img src="http://a1.files.readwrite.com/image/upload/c_fill,cs_srgb,w_620/MTE4MDAzNDE3ODcwNDY4NjIy.png" /><figcaption></figcaption></figure></div><p>“Most of [these messaging apps] started as a cheaper alternative to SMS and other messaging formats,” said Forrester analyst Thomas Husson, author of the report <a href="http://www.forrester.com/Messaging+Apps+Mobile+Becomes+The+New+Face+Of+Social/fulltext/-/E-RES116204?intcmp=blog:forrlink&amp;isTurnHighlighting=false&amp;highlightTerm=husson">Messaging Apps: Mobile Becomes The New Face Of Social</a>. “They were created in the last two, three, four years and they leverage app platforms, like iOS or Android, successfully reach out to hundreds of millions of customers worldwide.”</p><h2>Why Multiple Messaging Apps Will Thrive</h2><p>I still use SMS, but not as frequently as I did when I was younger. </p><p>There are six main messaging applications in the “social” bucket on my iPhone. For the most part, I use Apple's iMessage, which essentially hijacks the built-in texting service of your phone to send free messages over your data plan. I have two friends who only ever message me on Snapchat. Another prefers Google Hangouts. I rarely open Facebook Messenger—mostly when I forget how Facebook&nbsp;<a href="http://readwrite.com/2014/04/09/facebook-requires-users-to-download-messenger-in-order-to-chat-on-mobile">now pushes you into its standalone Messenger app</a>&nbsp;when you’re on your phone. I find Twitter’s direct-message feature, which is in&nbsp;<a href="https://twitter.com/Support/statuses/490260546818543618">desperate need of a rumored upgrade</a>,&nbsp;helpful for staying connected to people I only know tangentially through the Internet. I used to use Skype for work, though we dropped it for Slack, a <a href="http://readwrite.com/2013/08/14/stewart-butterfield-tiny-speck-slack">service that's designed to help teams communicate</a>.</p><p>Because all these messaging apps require both the sender and recipient to have the same service installed, what ends up happening is that we all have different friends on different applications. Figuring out which messaging app to use is like moving to a new city and figuring out which neighborhood to hang out in. If you want to see all your friends, you'll have to roam around.</p><p>My friends are not all alike. Some like sharing selfies from work that disappear after I’ve viewed them. Others prefer to send cute digital stickers, or voice-only messages which make me feel like a kid using walkie-talkies in the backyard. </p><h2>Facebook Won't Own Messaging The Way It Owns Social Networking</h2><p>The shift from one-to-many communication, like Twitter and Facebok, to one-to-few, like WhatsApp and WeChat, is forcing startups and social giants alike to rethink their strategy.&nbsp;</p><p>Messaging apps are trying to take the basic human need for chatting with friends and family and turn it into something at once unique enough to draw interest, yet simple enough for the masses to adopt.</p><p>“Look at Facebook in particular and how they’re reacting to this WhatsApp acquisition, and the decision to not necessarily integrate that service into one single digital platform, but ... create a constellation of apps,” Husson said. “More and more services are integrated into it—not like the one-size-fits-all social media app that Facebook used to be.”</p><p>The rise of Snapchat prompted Facebook to create a <a href="http://readwrite.com/2012/12/21/test-driving-poke-facebooks-new-safer-sexting-app-for-tweens">copycat called Poke</a> that swiftly failed. Then it decided it might be better to buy than to build, snapping up WhatsApp, the world’s largest messaging app, <a href="http://readwrite.com/2014/02/19/facebook-whatsapp-acquisition">for $19 billion</a>.&nbsp;</p><p>It’s still gambling on building a disappearing-message service to rival Snapchat’s popularity, <a href="http://readwrite.com/2014/06/09/facebook-slingshot-snapchat-poke-ephemeral-messaging">but its latest attempt</a>, Slingshot, has slumped to No. 444 in the App Store for photo and video apps. Facebook's disappearing-message app is what's really disappearing.</p><p>Facebook is making many bets on messaging, though, from its own Facebook Messenger app to Instagram Direct, a tool for sending photos to a small group of people within the photo-sharing service, which normally broadcasts photos to the public like Twitter. On Android, Facebook Messenger takes over your regular texts, much like iMessage does on iPhones.</p><p>Before Facebook offered private messaging, users posted messages on each other's profiles in an attempt to communicate. It's clear that messaging is a crucial part of the Facebook experience. It's just not clear that Facebook, even with WhatsApp in its arsenal, will own all of messaging.</p><h2>The Fight Has Only Just Begun</h2><p>Just like we use different social networks for different purposes, messaging apps will fill distinct needs. </p><p>What people want in a messaging app is the same thing we’ve wanted since we texted our first “Hello": a way to privately connect with friends and family. Yo, a much-ridiculed app which lets you send just one word of acknowledgement to your friends, boils down that desire for connection to its purest essence.</p><div tml-image="ci01a8bfd7c67d860b" tml-image-caption="" tml-render-size="medium" tml-render-position="right"><figure><img src="http://a4.files.readwrite.com/image/upload/c_fill,cs_srgb,w_620/MTIzMDQ5NjYzNjA4MDMwNzMy.png" /><figcaption></figcaption></figure></div><p>There’s a lot riding on controlling how we talk to friends—just look at the billions companies are paying for messaging services.&nbsp;</p><p>But thanks to the pervasiveness of smartphones, and humans’ desire to connect with each other one on one or in small groups, messaging will only grow. And unlike in the world of social networks, where there's unquestionable value in centralizing our activity, nothing will drive people to use just one app.</p><p>For the foreseeable future, we'll live in a world where Snapchat lives alongside WhatsApp, where one-tap apps like Yo persist next to complex platforms for gaming and socializing like Line. Juggling multiple apps may be a mild aggravation for users like us. But if it means that no one company will control our most intimate communications, that seems like a tradeoff worth making.</p><p><em>Lead image by&nbsp;<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/wefi_official/10331536704">Anne Worner</a>, illustrations by </em><em>Nigel Sussman for ReadWrite</em></p>WhatsApp, Snapchat, and Yo, oh my!http://readwrite.com/2014/08/13/messaging-apps-fight-texting
http://readwrite.com/2014/08/13/messaging-apps-fight-textingSocialWed, 13 Aug 2014 10:53:34 -0700Selena LarsonFacebook To Eliminate Gifts, Its Online Gift-Card Shop<!-- tml-version="2" --><div tml-image="ci01b52904631b860c" tml-image-caption="No gift for you." tml-render-size="medium"><figure><img src="http://a3.files.readwrite.com/image/upload/c_fill,cs_srgb,dpr_1.0,q_80,w_620/MTIxNDI3Mjk1MDg3OTIwNjUz.jpg" /><figcaption>No gift for you.</figcaption></figure></div><p>Facebook will finally stop nudging you to buy your Facebook friends a Starbucks gift card on their birthdays.</p><p>The company is shutting down Facebook Gifts, the&nbsp;e-commerce service that lets users buy electronic gift cards from companies like iTunes, Starbucks and Sephora and send them to friends. Gifts will be gone on August 12.&nbsp;</p><p>TechCrunch first <a href="http://techcrunch.com/2014/07/29/an-obituary-for-facebook-gifts/">reported the news</a> earlier on Tuesday, and the company confirmed the move to ReadWrite.</p><p>"We’ll be using everything we learned from Gifts to explore new ways to help businesses and developers drive sales on the Web, on mobile, and directly on Facebook," a Facebook spokeswoman told ReadWrite.</p><p>This is not the first time Facebook has cut back on its gifting options. Facebook had previously offered physical gifts as an option, later limiting its selection to digitally delivered gifts.</p><p>The Gifts shutdown comes on the heels of Facebook <a href="http://readwrite.com/2014/07/17/facebook-test-payments">introducing a "buy" button</a>, a way for businesses and advertisers to encourage people to purchase things simply from a Facebook post. That tool is currently in a limited test.</p><p>Facebook is clearly ramping up its e-commerce and payments efforts. It recently hired former PayPal president David Marcus to oversee its messaging products.&nbsp;</p><p>During Facebook's second-quarter earnings call on July 23, CEO Mark Zuckerberg said there will be "some overlap" between its Messenger application and payments. In other countries, particularly China, messaging apps often include features that allow users to send each other money.</p><p>And Facebook funnels payments from consumers to app developers in some transactions, like the purchase of digital goods. But it has struggled to link its prodigious traffic to real-world transactions.</p><p><em>Lead image courtesy of <a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/pedrosek/7431955734">Petr Dosek on Flickr</a></em></p>The gift that doesn't keep on giving.http://readwrite.com/2014/07/29/facebook-gifts-shutdown
http://readwrite.com/2014/07/29/facebook-gifts-shutdownSocialTue, 29 Jul 2014 18:04:03 -0700Selena LarsonFriday Fun: Create Your Own Obnoxiously Simple Messaging App Just Like Yo<!-- tml-version="2" --><p>You’ve heard about <a href="http://www.justyo.co/">Yo</a>, the bare-minimum messaging app that does nothing but send your friends a "Yo" message with just one tap. In its wake have come&nbsp;<a href="https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/oy-one-touch-sms/id895685479?ls=1&amp;mt=8">Oy</a>,&nbsp;<a href="https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/yo-hodor/id892110291?mt=8">Yo, Hodor</a>, and others.&nbsp;</p><p>Bare-bones messaging is all the rage, because, let's face it, actually composing a message made up of original words you think up in your head is a lot of work.</p><p>The sheer fatuousness of these apps has riled people up. While others pondered why anyone would sully the world by creating Yo and its ilk, we had a different question: How hard is it to code a simple messaging app that just sends a predetermined phrase?</p><p>There was only one way to find out.</p><p>We had to build our own annoying messaging app.</p><div tml-image="ci01af657b11e0860d" tml-image-caption=""><figure><img src="http://a3.files.readwrite.com/image/upload/c_fill,cs_srgb,w_620/MTE4MDAzNDE2OTg2MjU2OTEw.png" /><figcaption></figcaption></figure></div><p>Meet <a href="https://github.com/laurenorsini/one-click-message">One Click Message</a>, a Yo-like app built with the help of <a href="https://twitter.com/mattmakai">Matt Makai</a>, a developer evangelist at <a href="https://www.twilio.com/">Twilio</a>.</p><p>&nbsp;I used text messaging rather than push notifications because text is a universal, sure-fire way to annoy your friends without requiring them—as Yo does—to download an app.</p><p>I wrote the app in Python, an <a href="http://readwrite.com/2014/07/08/what-makes-python-easy-to-learn">English-like programming language ideal for beginner developers</a> who want to make something silly while working with Python. It took all of 29 lines of code.&nbsp;</p><p>Here's a tutorial to help you follow along with the process, so you can see how easy it is for anyone to build a simple Yo clone.</p><p>One Click Message is a Web app, not a phone app, but it still texts anyone you want. When you build it, you select a word or phrase that you’d like to send in one click. Mine <a href="http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/rickroll">rickrolls</a> people with Rick Astley lyrics.</p><div tml-image="ci01af657b1220860d" tml-image-caption="" tml-render-size="medium" tml-render-position="center"><figure><img src="http://a2.files.readwrite.com/image/upload/c_fill,cs_srgb,w_620/MTIxNDI3Mjk0MjIxNjY1ODA1.png" /><figcaption></figcaption></figure></div><p>And when your friends text you back, you can display all their exasperated replies like trophies right there on your Web app. (Note to self: I may need to get a lawyer soon. Or new friends.)</p><p>There’s very minimal coding required to get this off the ground. While I'll walk you through how I wrote the app, you don't have to redo the raw coding. Instead, you can copy my work—feel free!—by cloning my GitHub repository, where I stored the source code for the very small, simple program.</p><p>Want your own? Here’s how to do it in just ten steps. </p><h2>1) Sign Up For Twilio</h2><p>Twilio is a company that makes developer-friendly set of tools for creating text and voice applications. Twilio lets you call and text your own phone number for free and charges three fourths of a penny for calls and text messages to any other phone.</p><div tml-image="ci01b2d98146a5860c" tml-image-caption="" tml-render-position="center" tml-render-size="medium"><figure><img src="http://a4.files.readwrite.com/image/upload/c_fill,cs_srgb,w_620/MTE5NTU2MzIyNjU4NjQ5NjEx.png" /><figcaption></figcaption></figure></div><p>When you sign up, Twilio will give you a phone number (this is what our app will use to text your friends) and API credentials (this is what will allow our app to access our account). I’ve blurred mine out because you should never share these with anybody! </p><h2>2) Upgrade Your Twilio Account</h2><p>In my previous tutorial, <a href="http://readwrite.com/2014/04/23/raspberry-pi-connected-home-fish-text-message-twilio">My Fish Just Sent Me A Text Message</a>, we used Twilio for free, because I was just sending texts to myself. But for a messaging app, we’re going to want to be able to text other people too, so we’re going to have to <a href="https://www.twilio.com/help/faq/billing-pricing/how-do-i-upgrade-to-a-paid-account">upgrade our Twilio account</a> by paying for it.</p><p>Twilio uses a credit card on file to bill you, but if you add $5 to your account, that’s enough to send and receive about 666 texts on your app—plenty for an experiment like this.</p><p>Why pay for texts? Twilio is one of the easiest ways I've found to integrate messaging into your development projects, and carriers charge for every text message anyway. It's hard to find a similar service that's both free and flexible.</p><p>I promise this is the first and last time you’ll have to fork over money for this tutorial. Let’s move on to another tiered free-to-pay tool, of which we’ll be using just the free part...</p><h2>3) Sign Up For Nitrous.io</h2><div tml-image="ci01af657b11e3860d" tml-image-caption=""><figure><img src="http://a2.files.readwrite.com/image/upload/c_fill,cs_srgb,w_620/MTIyMzk5Mjg5MTUxNzUxNjky.png" /><figcaption></figcaption></figure></div><p>There are a lot of options for spaces where you can build and host your own online app. When I built a <a href="http://readwrite.com/2014/06/20/random-non-sequitur-twitter-bot-instructions?awesm=readwr.it_j22A">random non-sequitur Twitter bot</a>, I used <a href="https://dashboard.heroku.com/apps">Heroku</a>. This time I’m using one of Heroku’s competitors, Nitrous.io. They’re both development environments and online hosts for apps. This means you don't have to think about setting up your own server—you can just run your code and go.</p><p>Why choose one Web-based app builder over another? In this case, I chose Nitrous because it launched with Twilio functionality already built in. Using a different service might mean having to write more code, and I wanted to do the least amount of work possible here.</p><p>Sign up with an email and wait for Nitrous.io to email you your confirmation. </p><h2>4) Create A New "Box" For Your Code</h2><p>On Nitrous.io, you build and host apps by putting them in different repositories, or as Nitrous calls them, boxes. A free account earns you one box. That's plenty.</p><p>Once you’re signed up with Nitrous, go to your dashboard and click the orange button that says "New Box." Ours is a Python app, so select “Python/Django.”</p><p>Don’t worry about the unusual name Nitrous.io will assign you. It does so to make sure every box has a unique name. Because it's so easy to create new boxes, Nitrous has to make sure it has lots of names available and they don't repeat.</p><p>Finally, at the bottom where it says, “Download a GitHub repo,” you’ll want to select my One Click Message repository by typing in <a href="https://github.com/laurenorsini/one-click-message.git">https://github.com/laurenorsini/one-click-message.git</a>.</p><p>Take a moment here, if you like, to look at my code. I use&nbsp;Flask, a microframework for Python, which adds new usability to Python in a number of different ways. For the purposes of this project, we're focusing on Flask's ability to simplify integrating Web-based forms with the Python language. In this case, it's a form that collects your friend's phone number and passes it on to Twilio, which in turn sends out your designated annoyance text.</p><p>Why use a microframework instead of just writing it all myself in Python? Because it's another opportunity to write less code than we have to. Instead of writing lines of code to bridge the gap between Web forms and Python functions, we just call Flask in to do our dirty work.</p><p>When you're done, it should look like this:</p><div tml-image="ci01af657b11e6860d" tml-image-caption=""><figure><img src="http://a5.files.readwrite.com/image/upload/c_fill,cs_srgb,w_620/MTIxNDI3Mjk0MjE3ODY0NzE3.png" /><figcaption></figcaption></figure></div><h2>5) Set up the Integrated Development Environment (IDE)</h2><p>When your box is created, there will be a new orange button below it that says IDE. An IDE, or integrated development environment, is just a place where you can work on code. Click it. You’re now in the part of Nitrous that lets you examine and edit your app’s code.</p><div tml-image="ci01a8bfd78ec1860b" tml-image-caption=""><figure><img src="http://a4.files.readwrite.com/image/upload/c_fill,cs_srgb,w_620/MTE5NDg0MDYxMjQ5NDA2NDc5.png" /><figcaption></figcaption></figure></div><p>There are a couple of panels here. To the left is the file hierarchy. If you click on “Workspace,” you’ll see the GitHub repository “one-click-message” populated beneath it. To the right is the chat. I usually just close that, because I'm working on this myself rather than with coding partners.&nbsp;</p><p>In the center is where you edit files. And the entire bottom half of the screen is the console, where you test and deploy programs. </p><p>Let’s go down to that bottom screen now. First, we need to install the Twilio API like this:</p><p><pre>pip install twilio</pre></p><p>This is one of the benefits of using Nitrous. Because we selected its Python option, pip, a program which helps install new Python code, is already installed.</p><div tml-image="ci01a87e1ee31b860f" tml-image-caption=""><figure><img src="http://a2.files.readwrite.com/image/upload/c_fill,cs_srgb,w_620/MTE5NDg0MDYxMjQ5NTM3NTUx.png" /><figcaption></figcaption></figure></div><p>Next, we’re going to install Flask, the framework that adds additional functionality to Python programs. Remember how our finished app allows you to input a phone number? While Twilio is adding messaging functionality, Flask makes it possible to build responsive Python forms.</p><p><pre>pip install flask</pre></p><p>Now you’ve got all the tools you need in your IDE to get this project going.</p><h2>6) Add Your Twilio Identication to App.py</h2><p>If you look inside the one-click-message folder, you’ll see that there are six files in it, not counting images. Two of these, form.html and messages.html inside the Templates folder, make up the visual Web pages that you see when you interact with the app. The cascading style sheet, form.css, is what makes them look pretty. </p><p>But the glue holding the entire project together is a Python script named app.py. This is the only part of the project you actually have to alter in order to get it to function.</p><p>Inside app.py, I’ve inserted comments about what certain parts of the program do. The part you need to pay attention to right now is:</p><p><pre>client = TwilioRestClient ('ABC', '0123')&nbsp;</pre></p><p><pre>twilio_number = "+1234567890"&nbsp;</pre></p><p>Fill in your Twilio credentials on the first line, and your Twilio phone number on the second. With these lines, we’re telling the program how to talk to Twilio's application programming interface, and whose account to use.</p><h2>7) The Fun Part: Add Your Message</h2><p>Maybe it’s a stupid joke. Maybe it’s a really long string of words you text to people frequently and are tired of writing out. Maybe it’s a really long stupid joke. Either way, you’re going to want to put it in on this line in app.py:</p><p><pre>client.messages.create(to=formatted_number, from_ = twilio_number, body = "Message of your choice.")&nbsp;</pre></p><p>As you can see, it’s easy enough to change the message by going back into app.py and adjusting this line. So just put something fun for now. </p><p>Note to out-of-United-States tutorial readers: This is also where you would want to customize the program with your country code.</p><p><pre>formatted_number = "+1" + number</pre></p><p>I’ve told the program to add “+1” to any number inputted in the app because I’m in the US and so are the people I plan to text. But it may be different for you.</p><p>Finally, don’t forget to save the newly edited app.py!</p><h2>8) Run Python</h2><p>OK, we’re getting close to finishing up! Go back to the console at the bottom and navigate to the folder where app.py lives like this:</p><p><pre>cd workspace</pre></p><p><pre>cd one-click-message</pre></p><p>cd is a command that stands for “change directory.” We’re changing from our main directory to the one where app.py is so we can run app.py. </p><p>Here’s how you actual run it:</p><p><pre>python app.py</pre></p><p>If you are in the right directory, the IDE should spit back something like this:</p><p><pre> * Running on http://0.0.0.0:3000/ </pre></p><p><pre> * Restarting with reloader </pre></p><h2>9) Preview Your App</h2><p>With Python still running, go to the navigation bar at the top of the IDE and select Preview: Port 3000. We want the public port 3000, not the SSL (secure socket layer) option.</p><div tml-image="ci01a8bfd78ebc860b" tml-image-caption=""><figure><img src="http://a2.files.readwrite.com/image/upload/c_fill,cs_srgb,w_620/MTIxNDI3Mjk0MjE4NTIwMDc3.png" /><figcaption></figcaption></figure></div><p>Your app should open up in another window, like this!</p><div tml-image="ci01af657b11e0860d" tml-image-caption=""><figure><img src="http://a3.files.readwrite.com/image/upload/c_fill,cs_srgb,w_620/MTE4MDAzNDE2OTg2MjU2OTEw.png" /><figcaption></figcaption></figure></div><h2>10) Get Texting!</h2><p>Try out your new app by texting your own phone number. Don’t forget, you need to put it in like this: 1234567890, not like this: (123) 456 - 7890 for it to work. (It wouldn't be hard to add a few more lines that match patterns by using a library like <a href="https://github.com/daviddrysdale/python-phonenumbers">python-phonenumbers</a>, but for simplicity, I skipped that.)</p><p>After you hit send, try sending a reply text, and refresh the page. This will probably be the least-irritated response you’ll get!</p><div tml-image="ci01af657b11e8860d" tml-image-caption="How the ReadWrite team replied to my app.&amp;nbsp;"><figure><img src="http://a3.files.readwrite.com/image/upload/c_fill,cs_srgb,w_620/MTIyMzk5Mjg5MTUxODE3MjI4.png" /><figcaption>How the ReadWrite team replied to my app.&amp;nbsp;</figcaption></figure></div><p>Text your friends, or share the app’s address with them and trick them into texting themselves. </p><p>Have fun! And if you get somebody to invest a million bucks in your obnoxious one-click messaging app, that’s just icing on the cake.</p><p><em>Lead photo by&nbsp;<a href="http://www.flickr.com/people/jhaymesisvip/">Jhaymesisviphotography</a></em></p><p><a href="http://www.imagecodr.org/"></a></p><p><strong> </strong></p>There's a reason why these bug-your-friends apps are proliferating.http://readwrite.com/2014/07/11/one-click-messaging-app
http://readwrite.com/2014/07/11/one-click-messaging-appHackFri, 11 Jul 2014 09:03:00 -0700Lauren OrsiniTwitter Won’t Encrypt Direct Messages, At Least For Now<!-- tml-version="2" --><p></p><div tml-image="ci01b2790060026d19" tml-render-position="right" tml-render-size="medium"><figure><img src="http://a1.files.readwrite.com/image/upload/c_fill,cs_srgb,dpr_1.0,q_80,w_620/MTIyMjkzMTgwNzk5NDE4OTgy.jpg" /></figure></div><p>Twitter is reportedly no longer working on a project to encrypt users’ direct messages—a move that would make its users’ communications better able to stand up to efforts by hackers and government spies to snoop on them.&nbsp;</p><p>As early as last October, Twitter was <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2013/11/01/technology/angry-over-us-surveillance-tech-giants-bolster-defenses.html?pagewanted=all&amp;_r=3&amp;&amp;version=meter+at+8&amp;region=FixedCenter&amp;pgtype=Article&amp;priority=true&amp;module=RegiWall-Regi&amp;action=click">said to be working on strengthening the security</a> of direct messages, the only private means of communications on the service. <a href="http://www.theverge.com/2014/3/19/5523656/twitter-gives-up-on-encrypting-direct-messages-at-least-for-now">According to The Verge</a>, the company has halted the program for no apparent reason.</p><p>The company has put an increased focus on its direct-messaging feature in recent months, completely <a href="http://readwrite.com/2013/11/20/twitter-app-update-messaging">overhauling the service</a> late last year. If Twitter were to launch encrypted messages, it would bolster its offering against competition from the growing pool of standalone messaging applications that <a href="http://readwrite.com/2013/12/20/snapchat-rivals-competitors">offer secure communications</a>.</p><p>Twitter was one of the many technology companies that aimed to bolster privacy and security measures in the wake of revelations about the extent of US government spying by NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden in mid-2013. Because Twitter is a public platform, the only private conversations happen via protected accounts or direct messages, so it makes sense for the company to focus security efforts on direct messages or DMs.</p><p>The company is also among the most vocal in calling for more transparency from the federal government regarding requests for user data, and it was the <a href="https://www.eff.org/who-has-your-back-2013">only company to receive a perfect score</a> on the Electronic Frontier Foundation’s “Who Has Your Back” report in 2013. The social network is <a href="http://readwrite.com/2014/02/06/twitter-transparency-report-government-justice-department-doj">not content with the agreement</a> other tech companies have reached with the US government on data requests. Twitter contends that without the ability to specify exact numbers around national security requests, it’s not meaningful to users.</p><p>It’s unclear why Twitter halted its encryption efforts. For one thing, since users can opt to receive direct messages by SMS and email, encryption on Twitter's own apps and websites may only give limited benefits. The company could also be choosing to put energy and attention into attracting new users rather than building new features. Though the company is seeing increasing revenues, <a href="http://readwrite.com/2014/02/05/twitter-user-growth">user growth is slowing</a>.</p><p>Twitter did not respond to a request for comment. We'll update the story if we hear back.</p><p><em>Lead image courtesy of Reuters</em></p>The information-broadcasting network is no longer working to secure private messages, according to reports.http://readwrite.com/2014/03/19/twitter-wont-encrypt-direct-messages-at-least-for-now
http://readwrite.com/2014/03/19/twitter-wont-encrypt-direct-messages-at-least-for-nowSocialWed, 19 Mar 2014 11:33:05 -0700Selena LarsonThe 10 Most Popular Mobile Messaging Apps In The World<!-- tml-version="2" --><p>With Facebook's<a href="http://readwrite.com/2014/02/19/facebook-whatsapp-acquisition">&nbsp;acquisition of WhatsApp</a>&nbsp;last month, mobile messaging apps have taken center stage thanks to the sheer weight of their ever-expanding user bases. Such apps are colossal players in the mobile game, originating everywhere from Silicon Valley in California to Gurgaon, India.</p><p>Here are 10 international messaging apps whose worldwide influence is racking up millions of users from across the globe.</p><div tml-image="ci01b280e6d0016d19" tml-render-layout="inline" tml-image-caption=""><figure><img src="http://a2.files.readwrite.com/image/upload/c_fill,cs_srgb,dpr_1.0,q_80,w_620/MTIyMzAxODY3NjM5MjEwNTk4.jpg" /><figcaption></figcaption></figure></div><h2>WhatsApp : United States&nbsp;</h2><div tml-image="ci01b280e720018266" tml-render-layout="inline" tml-image-caption=""><figure><img src="http://a5.files.readwrite.com/image/upload/c_fill,cs_srgb,w_620/MTIyMzAxODY5MjQ5ODE3ODgx.png" /><figcaption></figcaption></figure></div><p>With 450 million monthly users, it’s clear why this US-based messaging giant has been the talk of the town. Now under Facebook’s ownership, <a href="http://www.whatsapp.com/">WhatsApp</a> is still available for iOS, Android, Windows Phone, BlackBerry and Symbian.</p><h2>Viber : Cyprus&nbsp;</h2><div tml-image="ci01b280e7a0018266" tml-render-layout="inline" tml-image-caption=""><figure><img src="http://a3.files.readwrite.com/image/upload/c_fill,cs_srgb,w_620/MTIyMzAxODcwODYwNDM2MDcw.png" /><figcaption></figcaption></figure></div><p>Over 300 million registered members use this Cyprus-based app. In February of 2014, <a href="http://www.viber.com/">Viber</a> was bought by Japan-based e-commerce and Internet service company Rakuten for $900 million.</p><h2>WeChat : China&nbsp;</h2><div tml-image="ci01b280e7f0016d19" tml-render-layout="inline" tml-image-caption=""><figure><img src="http://a2.files.readwrite.com/image/upload/c_fill,cs_srgb,w_620/MTIyMzAxODcyNDcxMDQzMzUz.png" /><figcaption></figcaption></figure></div><p><a href="http://www.wechat.com/en/">WeChat</a> is owned by China’s Tencent, one of China’s largest Internet service providers, and has amassed a following of 450 million monthly users since its founding in 2010.</p><h2>Line : Japan&nbsp;</h2><div tml-image="ci01b280e860018266" tml-render-layout="inline" tml-image-caption=""><figure><img src="http://a1.files.readwrite.com/image/upload/c_fill,cs_srgb,w_620/MTIyMzAxODc0MzUwMDk2OTk4.png" /><figcaption></figcaption></figure></div><p>With their array of teen-friendly cartoon stickers, Japan’s Naver-owned <a href="http://line.me/en/">Line</a> app boasts over 350 million registered users.</p><h2>KakaoTalk : South Korea&nbsp;</h2><div tml-image="ci01b280e8b0018266" tml-render-layout="inline" tml-image-caption=""><figure><img src="http://a4.files.readwrite.com/image/upload/c_fill,cs_srgb,dpr_1.0,q_80,w_620/MTIyMzAxODc1NjkyMjc0Mjc4.jpg" /><figcaption></figcaption></figure></div><p>South Korea’s <a href="http://www.kakaotalk.com/talk/en">KakaoTalk</a> has over 100 million registered users. This messaging app partnered with Evernote in 2013, in an effort to integrate the U.S. service onto the KakaoTalk mobile app.</p><h2>Kik : Canada&nbsp;</h2><div tml-image="ci01b280e900018266" tml-render-layout="inline" tml-image-caption=""><figure><img src="http://a2.files.readwrite.com/image/upload/c_fill,cs_srgb,w_620/MTIyMzAxODc3MzAyODgxNTYx.png" /><figcaption></figcaption></figure></div><p>University of Waterloo students founded <a href="http://www.kik.com">Kik</a> in 2009, which has gained a following of over 130 million registered users. Operating out of Ontario, Canada, this app boasts 200,000 new members per day.</p><h2>Tango : United States&nbsp;</h2><div tml-image="ci01b280e970016d19" tml-render-layout="inline" tml-image-caption=""><figure><img src="http://a2.files.readwrite.com/image/upload/c_fill,cs_srgb,w_620/MTIyMzAxODc4OTEzNDk0Mjk3.png" /><figcaption></figcaption></figure></div><p>Silicon Valley-based messaging app <a href="http://www.tango.me">Tango</a> is being utilized in over 224 countries, and according to a Tango representative, is reaching 190 million registered users and growing.</p><h2>Nimbuzz : India&nbsp;</h2><div tml-image="ci01b280e9d0036d19" tml-render-layout="inline" tml-image-caption=""><figure><img src="http://a3.files.readwrite.com/image/upload/c_fill,cs_srgb,dpr_1.0,q_80,w_620/MTIyMzAxODgwNTI0MzY5MTc3.jpg" /><figcaption></figcaption></figure></div><p>150 million registered users utilize <a href="http://www.nimbuzz.com">Nimbuzz</a>, whose headquarters are located in Gurgaon, India. Founded in 2006, this app focuses on messaging, Voice over Internet Protocol, and social networking.</p><h2>hike : India&nbsp;</h2><div tml-image="ci01b280ea40016d19" tml-render-layout="inline" tml-image-caption=""><figure><img src="http://a5.files.readwrite.com/image/upload/c_fill,cs_srgb,w_620/MTIyMzAxODgyMTM0OTE2Mzc3.png" /><figcaption></figcaption></figure></div><p>Based out of India, it’s no wonder 60% of <a href="http://www.hike.in">hike</a>’s 15 million registered users come from the home country. The other 40% of users originate from Europe and the Middle East, proving a very diverse international appeal.</p><h2>MessageMe : United States&nbsp;</h2><div tml-image="ci01b280eaa0016d19" tml-render-layout="inline" tml-image-caption=""><figure><img src="http://a4.files.readwrite.com/image/upload/c_fill,cs_srgb,dpr_1.0,q_80,w_620/MTIyMzAxODg0MDEzNzY3OTYx.jpg" /><figcaption></figcaption></figure></div><p>Born out of San Francisco, this app was founded in 2012 and works to increase engagement by upping the communication experience through stickers, music, and photos. <a href="http://www.messageme.com">MessageMe</a> has 5 million registered users and growing.</p><p><em>Editor's note: The maps and graphics in this story show incorrect boundaries for India and China. Because we no longer have the original source files and the illustrator who created the images is no longer with ReadWrite, we're not in a position to substitute corrected graphics. ReadWrite regrets the cartographic errors.</em></p><p><em>Image courtesy of <a href="http://www.shutterstock.com/">Shutterstock&nbsp;</a></em></p>Who are the international titans of texting?http://readwrite.com/2014/03/06/10-biggest-popular-mobile-messaging-apps-world-whatsapp
http://readwrite.com/2014/03/06/10-biggest-popular-mobile-messaging-apps-world-whatsappMobileThu, 06 Mar 2014 07:02:00 -0800Stephanie Ellen ChanKill Email, Or Leapfrog It?<!-- tml-version="2" --><p>Email is a problem. But what kind of problem? That depends on the workplace. And two very similar companies are coming up with very different solutions.</p><p>Tiny Speck, which is opening <a href="http://slack.com/">its work-collaboration service</a>, Slack,&nbsp;to the public on Wednesday, aims to untangle inboxes for workers drowning in information.&nbsp;Cotap, a startup <a href="http://www.marketwired.com/press-release/-1872953.htm">recently launched</a> by early Yammer employees, is targeting employees who don't have email at all.&nbsp;</p><p>Both companies are based in San Francisco; Tiny Speck has 18 employees, while Cotap has 17.&nbsp;In a huge market for communications tools that's getting upended by the rise of mobile devices, there’s likely enough room for both products to thrive.</p><h2>Email: Can’t Live With It, Can’t Live Without It</h2><p>The average office worker spends 28% of their day <a href="http://www.mckinsey.com/insights/high_tech_telecoms_internet/the_social_economy">dealing with email</a>, and another 33% gathering information and collaborating internally, according to the McKinsey Global Institute.</p><p>Yet companies in large sectors of the economy—including many of the <a href="http://www.usatoday.com/story/money/business/2013/08/22/ten-largest-employers/2680249/">largest U.S. employers</a>, for example—don't offer employees email, relying on break-room flyers or briefings by managers to pass directives down from headquarters.&nbsp;</p><p>It’s an information feast or famine, depending on what kind of job you have.</p><p>Both are large markets: There are about 615 million "<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knowledge_worker">knowledge workers</a>" in the world, Cotap estimates—typically people with company-provided email addresses. Yet there are about 2 billion total workers, which suggests the non-knowledge-worker market may be twice as large. And all workers need a competent communication tool.</p><h2>No Worker Left Behind</h2><p>At both Slack and Cotap, past jobs shaped the founders’ visions for the product.</p><p>Cotap CTO Zack Parker dropped out of high school and worked at a toy store and Jamba Juice before eventually landing a job in technology.</p><p>"I always knew that I was smart,” Parker said. "It took me a long time to build up a resume that showed that I had something valuable to contribute."</p><p>Parker recalls&nbsp;working at a Jamba Juice where the store manager didn't let workers serve a special Halloween smoothie "because he thought it was satanic."</p><p>"It was a kooky, weird place which might have been a more normal, integrated place if we could have talked to other people in the company," he said.</p><p></p><div tml-image="ci01b280d3d0016d19" tml-image-caption="Cotap’s app resembles popular consumer messaging apps." tml-render-position="right" tml-render-size="medium"><figure><img src="http://a3.files.readwrite.com/image/upload/c_fill,cs_srgb,dpr_1.0,q_80,w_620/MTIyMzAxNzg2MzAzMjY3NDMw.jpg" /><figcaption>Cotap’s app resembles popular consumer messaging apps.</figcaption></figure></div><p>Cotap's mobile app aims to bridge the gap between frontline workers and headquarters by offering a text-message-like communication experience without the need for employees to share their phone numbers. It takes design cues from popular messaging apps like WhatsApp and Facebook Messenger: For example, you can simply acknowledge a message with a thumbs-up icon.</p><p>Parker thinks this will make workplaces less hierarchical:&nbsp;“Everyone is reachable by everyone in the company.”&nbsp;As a result, the employees who work directly with customers and have good ideas can become more&nbsp;“visible”&nbsp;to colleagues in headquarters.</p><p>Cotap hasn't set pricing yet, but it plans to launch a paid version of its service this year.</p><h2>Cutting Colleagues Some Slack</h2><p>Butterfield, meanwhile, vividly recalls the horrors of the corporate email systems at Yahoo, which acquired his photo-sharing startup, Flickr, in 2005. He had to constantly file email into folders, and then remember which folder he put it in.</p><p>At Tiny Speck, Butterfield swore he would run the company without email, and his team built internal tools based on <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_Relay_Chat">Internet Relay Chat</a> to accomplish this goal. The company’s first product failed—an online game called Glitch—but Butterfield kept a small team and turned Tiny Speck’s communication tools into Slack.</p><p></p><div tml-image="ci01b280d460016d19" tml-image-caption="Slack is a new approach to collaboration based on Internet Relay Chat." tml-render-position="left" tml-render-size="medium"><figure><img src="http://a2.files.readwrite.com/image/upload/c_fill,cs_srgb,w_620/MTIyMzAxNzg3NjQ1NDQ0NzEw.png" /><figcaption>Slack is a new approach to collaboration based on Internet Relay Chat.</figcaption></figure></div><p>Besides email lists, information workers are inundated by email-based notifications—bug reports, customer-service tickets, server-status updates. Slack pipes updates from Dropbox, GitHub, MailChimp, Crashlytics, and others—all the modern tools an app developer or other tech-product company might use—into a common workspace and makes them quickly searchable.</p><p>Slack also smartly distributes notifications to desktop and mobile devices. An unread desktop notification turns into a mobile push notification, for example, while read messages are neatly synched across devices.</p><p>Slack is offering a free version of its service with storage and message limits, as well as a paid version for which it will charge $8 per user per month.</p><h2>The Mobile Future Of Work</h2><p>The differences in the products show in their usage. Slack has 16,000 users, but only 57% of those users log in using both mobile and desktop on a daily basis, and activity among Slack customers usually takes a dive on the weekends.</p><p>As Butterfield told me last year, Slack is primarily "for people who sit in front of computers all day”—coders, product managers, and other tech-infused office workers.</p><p>Cotap, meanwhile, is a much simpler mobile-only product, though it's considering a desktop version, and users are often active outside regular working hours.</p><p>"People check in every morning,” Parker said. “We chat on the weekends. It's brought people together more as friends than as coworkers. It's created this sense of always being able to interact with each other."</p><p>Despite the products' differences, it’s interesting how Slack and Cotap both anticipate a post-email economy. Butterfield points out how Cozy, an <a href="https://www.cozy.co/">online rent-payment startup</a> he’s advising, had to add text-message support for younger tenants who “never check email.” Cotap is aiming to serve workers who never get overwhelmed by work email because they never got it in the first place.</p><p>Parker thinks Cotap’s mission will inspire prospective employees.</p><p>"When I'm talking to candidates, people just don't often in this industry have a sense for what a bubble we live in,” he says. "Candidates get excited when they realize there's a much broader set of people they can reach."</p><p>Butterfield hopes customers will get excited about the prospect of slaying the email beast. In early tests, some customers found it reduced their email volume by 75%.</p><p>And there's a rising sense that email’s just not the universal communication tool it once was, especially for younger employees who've grown up with texts and messaging apps.</p><p>"There isn't this idea [anymore] that email is the canonical way to communicate with someone," Butterfield said.</p><p><em>Photo of Zack Parker courtesy of Cotap</em></p>Slack is trying to rescue workers drowning in email. Cotap hopes to help workers who never got email in the first place.http://readwrite.com/2014/02/12/cotap-slack-email-apps-replacements
http://readwrite.com/2014/02/12/cotap-slack-email-apps-replacementsWorkWed, 12 Feb 2014 09:00:00 -0800Owen Thomas